Farewell

This post is a farewell to a lot of things some good and some bad.  First of all, this is the last blog post I'll be making for several reasons.  This was originally intended to just be a summer project and I think it served its purpose; I feel like it helped me express some things that I needed to get off my chest and made me really think about my opinions.  Also, I know that I'm going to be plenty busy once I go back to school (TOMORROW, can you tell I'm excited?) and won't be able to devote time to this like I could over the summer.  So farewell to this blog and to anyone who read it (which was honestly probably only one person, you know who you are) thank you for caring enough to read my rambling thoughts and I hope you got something out of it in the end or at least understand me a little better!  Second, this post is a farewell to all the negative emotions and insecurities I brought home with me.  It's time to start a new year at school and that means a clean slate to me so I'm going to try desperately to remain the confident person I truly am and not let anyone or anything make me doubt myself.  Zen master and human rights activist Thich Nhat Hanh said "People have a hard time letting go of their suffering.  Out of fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar".  I'm saying, screw that! I'm done being comfortable with what I know, even if the unknown doesn't work out how I would like or with the people I would like it has to be better than not enjoying where I am now.  Rather than look at the giant question mark looming over my head this year as anxiety inducing I'm going to look at it as one great adventure, the Great Perhaps if you will!  This is also a farewell to my friends from home that I won't get to see for a while.  You have made my summer worthwhile and when I was at my lowest you reminded me that I'm surrounded by people who genuinely care about me and enjoy spending time with me.  Without all of you I would not be as happy or as sane as I am, not that it's saying much considering I'm pretty crazy... but so are all of you so it works!  This is a farewell to a job that slowly whittled away at my IQ all summer with the knowledge that next summer will be much more enriching I know it!  And last but not least, it's a farewell to any outdated inhibitions that stopped me from truly enjoying myself last year.  I'm saying goodbye to my teenage years very soon and I don't want to waste another year of my youth worrying about how it will affect me later on in life!  I've never cared very much about what others thought of me, but I care a lot about how I view myself and if I can't let loose a little bit I'm not going to like who I am in the future, bittnerness runs in the family and I don't want that!  Hopefully my cheerful energized outgoing personality can translate over to this new mindset and I won't stand in my own way anymore.  So that's about it, I'm all packed up and ready to get back to school and explore this new year and all it has to offer with friends from last year and new friends I have yet to make! 
Have a RUN-believable day and thanks for reading!
Song Suggestion: I'm So Excited by the Pointer Sisters (for obvious reasons!)

Those Days Where You See Everyone You Ever Knew At The Worst Possible Moments...

Also referred to as "stop making questionable decisions in public Sarah!" The topic on my mind today is how to we gauge what's considered pushing ourselves too far outside of who we are from just enough to challenge ourselves and experience new things?  And why is it that in my sporadic moments of insanity I have to face the consequences long after because of the people I'm with?   I really don't think it's possible to experience anything alone because the brain was built for interaction and without it we would shrivel up and die an intellectual death which means that we really can't get away with anything.  So that means that when I decide to try not being a super up-tight person for one night and really just let go I have to do so in the presence of other people... bummer.  Slightly huge bummer for me actually because I did manage to have one of the craziest nights of my life the other night and enjoyed myself immensely only to realize that I'd be facing some rather lasting consequences the next day as a result.  And the overwhelming feeling I got from myself and others was that they never would have believed I would do a number of things that I did.  Is that a good thing or a bad thing?  Is it tragic that people have such a narrow view of who I am or that they don't think I'm capable of certain things.  But at the same time they're getting these perceptions from the way I've been presenting myself all these years.  To be honest, I'm still a little, okay a lot, shocked by my own actions.  I just kept thinking "This isn't me, I never do this", over and over again but I can't escape the fact that it happened so does that mean I am that person or does it mean that there are just sides of me that I never had the chance to fully explore before.  I guess that's what growing is all about and I just have to figure out the direction I want to grow in so as not to stray too far into that grey area of doing things I normally wouldn't just for the sake of trying something new even if it isn't something I'm particularly interested in.  Sorry that this post is so convoluted my thoughts are kind of all over the place at the moment.  Re-reading this makes it sound like I robbed a bank or something so I should clarify, I was well within the limits of the law, just not my own moral compass.  I broke a rule of mine that, while extremely silly and very outdated, I have truly believed in at least on principle.  I'm just not sure if I want to explore that path any further and I'm also not sure if my hesitancy to do so is a result of others reactions or because I really shouldn't or because of my previous notion of life holding me back... so many if's and's or but's in this process for me! In the end, I think that our wildest moments are when we triumph the most and when we fail harder than any other time.  It's all a big question mark out there and the only person who can answer it for us is ourselves so at some point in our lives we have to take chances and try to chip away at the unknown.  And try not to let what others believe to sway you, I've found that most people can be easily persuaded to change how they view someone else.  Whew.  I'm going to try to stop freaking out about this completely out of character night for me and just be amused and a little intriqued by it! Who knows what else the future holds for me, hopefully my sophomore year of college will start it off right and if last night was any indication, it's going to be an interesting year!
Shout out to my friend for coming to my work today and hanging out with me so I didn't die a slow and painful death by boredom!  Holy Cannoli do I have a story to tell you tomorrow at dinner!

Song Suggestion: Wildest Moments by Jessie Ware; she writes her own music and this song spoke to me on so many levels today it's not even funny.  Also, after listening to this if you don't immediatley go listen to everything else she has out there then you are a heartless soulless individual (not really I'm sure you're very nice, just have different tastes)
Have a RUN-believable day!

Adrenaline

Call me crazy (or maybe, whichever you prefer), but I went to go see the Dark Knight Rises after watching the U.S. women's national team come back three different times to win the game 4-3 in the 123rd minute which for those of you who don't watch soccer means that in the injury time added to overtime! Alex Morgan, my favorite USWNT player and at this moment the love of my life, scored after a 3-game drought and my hands were shaking I was so excited! 

(Look. at. that. swag.)

It's been a little while since I've felt the adrenaline that comes from playing a full soccer game, but I certainly recognize it when I feel it.  Then I went with some friends to see the Dark Knight Rises which is jam-packed with action and suspense and just plain craziness!  On top of my already hyper-sensitivity that movie was a lot to handle in the best of ways and now I'm listening to music at an ear-deafening volume unable to even pretend to go to sleep and I needed to post about this feeling because it's powerful and it's a rush.  It makes me feel alive and there are very few times in my life that I can pinpoint where I felt this alive.  This past year there are some very specific instances I can think of, but I try my hardest not to do so which makes this feeling so important now.  It's nice to know that we as human beings are capable of feeling so fully even when it's for others and I like knowing that I can express my vitality in a lot of different ways whether it's with others or for others.  Congratulations Alex Morgan and the U.S. Women's National team, redemption against Japan is right around the corner!

Have a RUN-believable day!
Song Suggestion: Just switch back and forth between Rihanna and Nicki Minaj, you will never sleep! Specifically Roc Me Out and Pound the Alarm... I feel like doing something either really productive or destructive right now, let's hope my responsible side wins out!

The Sourest of Lemonade for the Sweetest of Reasons

I almost didn't post anything about this because it just felt too soon, but honestly this story needs to be shared.  My friend and I were bombarded by lemons from the universe this past week and if nothing else someone should get a good laugh out of this!  So here it goes, I'm going to list all of the weird/terrible things that happened to us in chronological order
1. I didn't get to listen to any Justin Bieber the entire road trip! (Just kidding... kind of)
2. My car completely broke down due to what I would later find out was a blown ACL (I may have misheard the mechanic) It was actually my PCM fuse if that means anything to you which it didn't to me!

(This is exactly what we looked like stranded at the rest stop, same poses and everything... Bahaha NOT!)

3. We missed the Ingrid Michaelson concert
4. The guy who towed us was pretty cute, unfortunately having to pay obscene amounts of money to get towed detracts from his cuteness just a little bit
5. The 24-hour shop was in fact not open 24-hours as the name would suggest (false advertising if I've ever seen it!)
6. We ended up spending the night with our friend's aunt and uncle who we had never met before aka the nicest people ever, but still what a weirdly coincidental situation!
7. We were propositioned to race on the highway from a man in a broken down black car in what will probably go down as one of the shadiest moments of my life (we totally won by the way)
8. 20 minutes away from our final destination 24 hours after we were meant to arrive a pick-up truck blows a red light going down a one-way street and almost crashes right into us
9. I drank a little too much lemonade and said some pretty counterproductive things that I regretted almost immediately and immensely (that's more of a personal issue though, can't reall blame it on the universe, that one was all me)
10. Painted a rock and transformed it into a kick-ass door stop! (This is just me blatantly bragging)
11. Spent the next night staring at a new ceiling (it was a nice change of pace, I was getting a little tired of mine) struggling with my own jealousy issues and my inability to act like a grown-up when the situation calls for it ( I really like blaming the universe for my own issues don't I?)
12. Spent a night in a park dressed like a hooker (probably not the last time I'll have to type that out... JOKE hopefully)
13. After spending an extra day with our friend to make up for lost time we we're making good time due to my superior driving skills when all of a sudden an entire highway was closed with actually zero warning leaving us stuck in bumper to bumper traffic
14. We moved 1 mile in an hour and a half... then proceeded, with some questionable driving on my part, to brave the back streets in order to get home before the apocalypse!
Eventually we did get home and are both keeping our fingers crossed that our luck turns around!  If this was some sort of retribution for what I wrote about karma before then consider me a reformist!
Now comes the sweet because even with all of this sour I can honestly say that I would go through all of it again just to get to visit our friend.  Seeing her was the sweetest reason I could've had for putting up with life's lemons and here I go adding some sticky sap to the equation!
My friends horoscope said that it doesn't matter what you're doing, it only matters who you're doing it with and this trip showed me the truth behind that statement.  No matter what I'm going through or how I feel I have been blessed to do it all with people that add a little sweetener to life's lemonade whether they're from home or from school and I can't thank them enough!  I hope that my sarcastic recall of our trip amused some of you!
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song suggestion: Brand New Day by Tim Myers because this song is the only song positive enough to counteract the bad karma I've been soaking in this past week!  And the only song that accurately reflects my outlook going forward

Small things

It's amazing what the Olympics, new running shoes, great music, baking, and something to look forward to can do for a person's health, just saying.  That's it, I literally have nothing else to say for the first time probably ever!  Go watch the Olympics and be patriotic for a couple of hours of your life, we may have a lot of issues but we know our sports man!  Particular shout-out to anyone that watches USWNT and if you don't know what that stands for, shame on you! They're gonna kick some Korean ass tomorrow and as a result I'll probably be super hyper so get ready person I'm riding in a car with for 4 hours afterwards!  Go USA!!
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song Suggestion: Gonna Get Over You by Sara Bareilles because it just came on and I haven't heard it in ages so there ya go

Exhausted

I'm exhausted. Mentally exhausted.  I just got back from vacation which explains my week long absence from this blog and I'm in the middle of what should be a couple of the most exciting weeks of my summer, but all I feel is exhaustion.  I'm so tired of being a screw-up and I foolishly thought that if I could get away from my own thoughts for a while in a happy vacation bubble that I would come out on the other end better for it.  Instead, it just made me realize that it was all waiting for me back at home and not dealing with it for a while just made it all that much harder to face all at once.  I'm tired of saying the wrong thing and feeling guilty for being insecure about things and feeling like I have to constantly make up for something or prove something.  Frankly, I'm just tired of the same old cycle of thoughts and I wish I knew how to break it, but I don't and I discovered that I actually can't or shouldn't talk about it with the people I want to because that just adds to the crushing guilt that I have to shelve if I expect to move forward.  I feel like I'm losing everything that I've been working so hard all year to hold on to.  I'm exhausted with these thoughts and I'm not exactly sure how to step sideways rather than putting one foot in front of the other in the same circle I've been going in lately.  Communication is extremely important to me, so not feeling like I can communicate properly when it matters is dragging me down right now, but writing it out is helping so thanks internet! There's a line from Of Monsters and Men's song Little Talks that says "There's an old voice in my head that's holding me back/Well tell her that I miss our little talks" and it hits me right in the feeler because I know that I'm holding myself back and from this point forward I'm going to find the energy to not do that anymore and make more of an effort to say what I should be saying not what that voice in my head says I should.  Don't worry, I'm not schizophrenic this is all figurative language I promise! I just miss talking to certain people the way I want to without hang-ups or insecurities and I'll do away with them soon enough because everything's fleeting, everything, good or bad so like my favorite state Wisconsin and President Obama say "Forward"!
Also, I've discovered that I'm more optimistic than I previously thought because for some reason I refuse to end on a negative note!
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song Suggestion: If you didn't realize this, Little Talks by Of Monsters and Men is kind of on repeat for me right now, I mean "listen to my words, screams all sound the same" is pretty deep stuff amiright??

Absolutes

It's been a while since I updated and that's mainly due to the fact that I didn't really think people needed to read all about my tragically boring thoughts centered around the only thing I've been doing lately which is work.  In order to not become comatose of boredom I've been working extra hard to stay busy in the few hours outside of work I have so I haven't had a chance to post, but that changes right now!  I read something the other day that got me thinking... why do we think in absolutes?  I tried really hard to come up with something that actually is absolute to its core and I can't come up with anything!  In particular, we think about people and their personality's in absolutes.  Truthfully, people are situational beings and therefore we can't say that someone is absolutely outgoing or absolutely introspective because we may only see them in a situation that brings that out in them.  Watching someone you know interact in different settings with a variety of people is enlightening to say the least!  I think we all have different sides and characteristics that present themselves in the opportune moment.  And I think that different people bring out parts of ourselves we may not even be aware of.  Take for instance the family dynamic; studies show that in a family with two siblings the older sibling is more domineering with their sibling and responsible around their parents while the younger sibling is more submissive, but prone to rebel around their parents.  However, the same studies show that those two siblings don't act that way outside of the family dynamic.  Basically, family sucks!  Just kidding (kind of) but in all honesty I bet everyone has different groups of people that they interact with in a certain way or portray themselves differently to fit the needs of the situation.  I'm not suggesting anything crazy like multiple personality disorder (though that diagnosis is incredibly fascinating and one day I'm going to find out if the separate personalities know about each other because if they do then what a conflict of interest!) all I'm saying is that you're not going to make a "That's what she said" joke in front of your grandma, unless of course your grandma acts like your best friend or is one of your best friends in which case I'm sorry to inform you that you're in good company and probably need to meet some more people too..., and you're not going to talk to your sibling the way you interact with your boss.  Nothing about our personalities is absolute and that's a check in the win column for human beings everywhere because we don't have to pick and choose who we are, we can have it all!  It's like an all-you-can-eat buffet of characteristics table for one please!
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song Suggestion: Anna Sun by Walk The Moon

Problems of the Personal Variety

Buckle up kiddos cause this is going to be pretty personal but hopefully at the end of it slightly better than when it started...
I have to own up to some stuff right now and say that I haven't been okay for a while now.  I have been rapidly losing weight in what I'm sure is a combination of stress, slight situational depression, and feeling guilty enough about practically everything to reach the point where I'm punishing myself by running all the time and not eating enough to make up for it.  On top of that,  I haven't been acting like myself lately at all which scares me more than the weight loss or anything else going on because I've always been able to rely on my own self-worth and esteem when things get really bad.  I guess I've just never experienced something where the problem was my own self-worth before and being "good enough" which is a really subjective concept instead of something I could fix.  One person noticed these problems and, like a true friend, called me out on my bullshit and I have to thank her for caring so much and hopefully this blog is enough of an admittance for her to see how grateful I am to her!  The reason I'm finally admitting that I may have a few issues to deal with right now (insert sarcastic tone here) is because this morning I woke up to something that could have potentially derailed my entire day and could have gotten even worse when I responded only to be effectively dismissed.  At the beginning of the summer this kind of thing would have made me feel completely worthless.  (Sorry about the painful honesty thing I have going on here, it's only going to get worse but I totally warned you so don't say I didn't tell you so.) Instead, I chose to be amused by it and just let it go.  I realized that I wouldn't want to talk to me lately either so why should anyone else?  I've been looking at the positives of everything else except for myself because for the longest time it was hard to find any, but after losing weight that I didn't even have to lose in the first place and spending the last few nights getting zero hours of sleep I realized that I have to start taking care of myself for me and no one else.  Younger Sarah didn't care if she was good enough for other people, she only cared that she was good enough for herself and I admire her a lot more now that I know how rare that attitude is the older you get.  I wanted to be a better me today because I wanted it, not because I needed to put on a facade for other people or impress someone and I did something I haven't done since summer started... I danced while I ran.  Logistically I know that sounds pretty dumb, but the way things have been for me music and running have been less of an escape and more of a reminder of how I feel at fault for everything that's happened and how emotionally charged my life has become.  So today I ran just to run and I danced along as I ran, made a complete fool of myself, ran backwards while having a conversation with someone I don't know, and when I got home my face hurt so bad from smiling so much that I could feel the happiness!  Then I did some emotional housekeeping which consisted of me throwing away every letter I ever wrote to people with no intention of ever sending them because I'm all about saying what I mean and meaning what I say so really what's the point of having a reminder of what I don't plan on telling people lying around?  After all of that, I feel like I can definitively say that I'm doing much better and I'm not naive enough to think that everything will just go away now that I'm back on the right track personally, but at least when things do get rough I know there's greener pastures and what not.  I can't help the fact that sometimes all I can think about is the last time I kissed someone (you can't really blame me, they're a really good kisser!) or how I wish I could be watching t.v. with them instead of alone because that would be so much better or how different things will be next year or how I used to look at myself and think "huh, not bad kid" but now all I think is "if I somehow looked different..." which is ludicrous because I am who I am and I look like I look so there must be some reason for it and that I put other people before myself for a different reason now than when I was younger - before it was because I was just fine and didn't need to focus on myself, now it's because I often care too much about other people and haven't felt worth my own attention- but not all of these things are bad things to be inable to squash (Also my apologies for the rambly nature of that sentence, actually you know what I'm not going to apologize for that because I ramble A LOT and I like it!)  It's all about using these things to my advantage.  Today I've been the Sarah that I want to hang out with and tomorrow I have to choose to be the same person and this doesn't seem like an insurmountable task anymore because despite everything going on I have people who do care about me and do want to hang out with me and some really exciting things to look forward to and now all I want to do is make myself a vegetarian gyro and have a dance party alone until the neighbors file a noise complaint and then count down the days until Jersey Shore, and Ingrid Michaelson, and going back to school and being my authentic self through all of it!  Also, I finally decided on what my tattoo is going to say which is both exhilirating and nauseating due to my fear of needles... but needles are hardly the most painful thing I've experienced to date and I'll spare you quoting Kelly Clarkson's Stronger by just saying I can't wait for what I haven't planned to happen to me (which is a miracle considering I once had a teacher tell me I was such a  Type A personality I was going to have a heart attack in the next two weeks, don't worry that was more than two weeks ago) and that I couldn't be happier that I'm finally in a place where I'm not just settling for what I can get, but am actually grateful and appreciative for what I have.
I'll leave you with a quote because this was a somber post and serious things should always be summed up with some sort of quote!
"You must always be intoxicated.  On wine, poetry or virtue, as you wish.  But you must get drunk." - Charles Baudelaire
You can take this either to mean that you should go out and get wasted and live it up or you can take it to mean that in everything we do we should immerse ourselves in it and live fully instead of doing things half-way.  Either way you take it, go get drunk and you do you! (See it got better at the end!)
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song Suggestion: Warrior by Kimbra, Mark Foster, and A-Trak

Being Considerate 101

I've only recently begun to notice how important certain gestures are and how I take them granted often.  In the realm of human interaction, is it so much to ask that people be considerate?  I'm honestly not asking for much, but what I am asking for is the little things, the "minute particulars" if you will (if you know what this is from then you're probably reading this blog regularly which baffles me, but thanks!), that build a genuine connection between two people.  For instance, eye contact is not something that should be taken lightly folks!  Often times at work people will barely divert enough attention away from their phone or another conversation to pay let alone look me in the eyes while they do it.  Eyes tell us far too much to not be shared honestly.  And I find that not just making eye contact, but holding it, while talking to people typically makes them uncomfortable.  Maybe I'm just weird in that way, but when someone's talking to me or I'm talking to them I give them my full attention and they should know it because they can see it.  I'm not saying have a staring contest with every person you talk to, though that could be fun, but I've noticed that sometimes there's a disconnect between what your mouth is saying and what your eyes mean when you say it that is just another dimension to the complicated machine that is the human form.  This totally just reminded me of an episode of Modern Family where Phil goes on and on about how he may be saying yes, but his eyes are saying no way jose (It's a lot better in the episode just watch it).  Anyways, another thing is making pleasantries with people.  I discussed this once with people back at school, but in the Midwest you say hi to complete strangers you pass on the sidewalk and they respond in kind.  That's just how it works. I once had someone who was driving past me as I walked home from school slow down, roll down the window, and say hello!  Where I live now, this isn't as likely to happen and when I say have a nice day to someone the least I expect is a "you too".  When I run past a lady walking her dog and wave from across the street is she going to break something waving back?  Not unless she has brittle bone disease in which case why is she walking her dog? My apologies to anyone reading this with brittle bone disease, I'm sure you would at least say hello!  Basically, there are so many people out there that are truly nice people who do these things without even realizing it and to those people I say thank you for being considerate and reveling in the knowledge that we're all people just trying to enjoy our lives.  To the people that are too busy or too good to wave hello or make eye contact when having a conversation, there are too many truly nice people in the world for it to be a difficult task to accomplish so next time someone waves to you and nearly runs into a stop sign doing so(true story) wave back!
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song Suggestion: Spin by Cassette Kids

Excuses

I could rant for pages right now about how people can make so many excuses for themselves all the time without ever taking any of the responsibility, but I won't do that because I really don't feel like being negative right now.  Instead, my anger got me thinking about how easy it is to make excuses which is probably why we all do it!  I also realized that angry running is probably the best, even better than "I'm way too overwhelmed to do anything except burn off energy" running which is saying a lot!  I make excuses for little things all the time, but I'm pretty conscientious about not making excuses for the things that matter.  Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of times where I want to, badly, but if nothing else I've learned from other people in my life that excuses are both easy to make and easy to see through.  To me an excuse is like the most basic form of lying and as such it's rarely thought out or backed up by anything.  As a future lawyer, fingers crossed, it's difficult to not poke holes in people's excuses all the time and just let them have their momentary relief because I have to accept that eventually the truth will win out.  And I don't mean in a "You can't handle the truth" kind of way (If you don't get this reference I strongly suggest you watch A Few Good Men) but in a "I've wasted all my credibility and no one believes my B.S. anymore" kind of way.  I firmly believe humanity hasn't been suckered too far into their Ipads and Iphones that they can't still spot when someone's trying to put something past them.  Isn't that Disney's saving grace, that the good guy always wins in the end.  So an excuse may be the easiest thing at the time and it may make you or someone else feel good through some sort of instant gratification, but in the end it's going to fall apart on you.  Plus, at least for myself, I've discovered that if I have to make an excuse about something I'm either not being fully honest with myself or I'm doing something I really shouldn't be... the latter usually involves eating copious amounts of junk food that I shouldn't!  Seriously, it's like the five stages of grief when that happens except I find myself stuck in the bargaining stage!  Regardless, excuses are a terrible excuse for a solution (see what I did there) and we're all better off being upfront about things with others and ourselves from the start!
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song Suggestion: Summertime Sadness by Lana Del Ray (The remix version is great running music!) 

Happy 4th of July!

USA. USA. USA. USA. Happy 4th of July and Happy Birthday America!! Holy shit this day has turned out to be the best birthday America has ever had in my opinion!  And yes every sentence will end in an exclamation point because I'm just in that great of a mood!  To me the 4th of July is about genuinely appreciating what we have and celebrating that in the loudest way possible!  Blasting music with all the windows down while I cruise around totally counts!  So stop reading this and I'm going to stop writing it and we're all going to eat a ton of good food, listen to great music, and hang out with fantastic friends! So Happy Excuse To Blow Stuff Up Day to everyone!!
Have a RUN-believable 4th of July!
Song Suggestion: Blow Me One Last Kiss by Pink (God Bless America is a given)

Brave

I totally wanted this post's title to start with "C" because then the last three would be a,b,c which I think would be awesomesauce, but unfortunately it does not.  However, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to write about something that truly resonated with me, the animated movie Brave.  I know, I know how old am I to be watching animated movies, but first of all Pixar knows their stuff and I read that they spent two years on the animation for the main characters hair because they animated every single strand (and it looked like it too!) so anyone that puts that kind of time and dedication into their product is a-okay in my book.  Second of all, we're never too old for a classic Disney lesson!  Only this time, the feminist in me was overjoyed to discover that the whole "Damsel-in-distress" act they've perfected so well over the years was missing from this film.  In place of stereotypical gender roles were some pretty fantastic scottish accents.  Not only did I think the message Disney was sending through Merida (I have no idea if that's how you spell her name, what can I say I don't have a drop of scottish in me) was apropos (and about damn time), but it was done in a way that didn't belittle any of the characters.  On top of that, the whole "my mother doesn't understand who I am and expects certain things from me that I don't want for myself" spiel is something I can definitely relate to!  Ya know, besides (spoiler alert!) the turning my mom into a bear part, I can't really relate to that as much.  So I got the repressive mother/only daughter issues without the magic or the really cool hair (I'm super jealous of her hair if you can't tell).  But anyways, the point is that I think Disney is moving in a positive direction with this movie and hopefully my feminist side (which really takes up a majority of my body mass) will have further cause to celebrate in the future!  And that even a college student who lives in modern day America can relate to and possibly gain something from a Pixar film about a scottish girl in line for marriage. 

(LOOK AT THAT HAIR!!)

It just goes to show how universal humanity truly is and yes I've mentioned this multiple times it's kind of a theme... Completely beside the point, I also discovered today that no matter what you do or how much peanut butter you smother it with, a banana is and always will be a banana.  They're gross and I wish that they didn't offer us essential nutrients, but alas they do so occasionally I force myself to eat one... one of these days I'll figure out a way to hide the banana for good!  And now for my rant: I'm headed over to a friends in a little while to watch the next Food Network Star and after last week when I lost my favorite contestant and went into mourning I don't know if my heart can handle another episode so a warning to Food Network - You better not mess with me again or I will go all sorts of crazy up in here!  That's all!

Have a RUN-believable day!

Song Suggestion: I couldn't pick between Mine Is Yours by Cold War Kids and Electric Feel by MGMT today so listen to both!

Blink

If you haven't read anything by Malcolm Gladwell make this book your first, and then follow it with The Tipping Point.  I'm about to straight up recommend this book like it's my job because I think I'm in love! The sociologist/part that's fascinated by human behavior in me was practically salivating at just the description alone, and now that I'm done with it I can honestly say that the insights and anecdotal evidence from this book are truly stupendous.  It's all about how sometimes we can just know things intrinsically without being able to explain why and how these snap judgments, though made on an unconscious level, can be easily swayed by too much information.  Things like how a college students best friends will do worse on a personality test than complete strangers who only got to spend ten minutes in their dorm room before taking the test!  He talks about stuff like thin-slicing which is what he describes as the unconscious process we go through everytime we meet a new person or have to evaluate a situation quickly.  Ever wonder why it is that we can just tell when we won't get along with someone or if we should trust them or not?  Well, apparently our subconcious is making these judgments based upon cues we couldn't describe if asked long before we even realize it!  I could go on and on about the examples from this book, but I won't spoil it for anyone who now plans on reading it, which I highly suggest if you haven't picked that up by now... On an unrelated note, I went to a concert put on by the Woodland Foundation which is a camp for kids and adults with mental and physical disabilities which I found out about through one of my best friends who works there and let me tell you, not only could some of them play the violin way better than I ever could, but I thought everyone involved was really courageous for doing something I know I couldn't do.  It was incredibly inspiring and humbling which was an excellent reminder to me that no matter how much of a bummer things are sometimes perspective is key and life is about finding that perspective and using it to your advantage.  So if my friend is reading this I have to say I'm blown away by what you're doing and incredibly proud of you!
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song Suggestion: You, Me, and the Bourgeoisie by the Submarines
Post-Script (Because I hate writing P.S. like this is some middle-school love note): Sorry about the lack of pictures, my computer and Blogger have been at odds with each other lately and until they make-up I'm afraid my posts will continue to be drab and colorless; curse you technology!

Association

Can I first just say that I love playing that word association game with people where they have to say the first thing that comes to mind when you say a word.  But that's not what this post is about.  This post is about how absolutley incredible it is that our mind automatically associates certain things with sounds, smells, tastes, touches, any sense you name it we associate things with it!  Sometimes I hear a song and I'm suddenly itching to go running, or start crying, or think about that time on my Senior Trip... nevermind about that, but it transports us to that time, just for a moment, and we can easily recall the most minute details.  A bunch of stuff does that for me, movies will remind me of a particular person I saw them with, food especially can make me recall memories I had put to the back of my mind.  I'm always fascinated by how startlingly easy it is to recall this stuff with a simple whiff or glimpse of something.  Maybe it's just the way our brains are hard-wired to code information, we are inclined to synthesize information to relate to something we previously learned so I guess it makes a lot of sense, but still it's crazy how we can associate seemingly random memories together!  Sometimes I don't even get a full memory or anything like that, it's just a feeling that I can't shake.  Regardless, I love the random spurts of association I have throughout the day, they make me feel more connected to people I'm missing or haven't seen in a while as well as my own life and the events happening in it.  Completely unrelated, but today someone got marshmallow fluff in my hair at work and two people in particular know exactly what I'm talking about when I say that there are two things I absolutely cannot stand: sweat and getting sticky things like marshmallow in my hair!  Running today was an exersize in endurance both physically and mentally because all I wanted to do was shower away the sweat and the marshmallow; I guess if anything I learned that a little marshmallow in your hair never killed anyone so deal with it kid!  I just realized that I use that phrase a lot, "it never killed anyone" and I figure it just means that I like to think if it can't kill me then why not which isn't a super cautious way to approach things, but being cautious is so overrated anyways.  Sorry that this got super rambly (pretty sure that's not a word) my mind was just all over the place on my run today.
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song Suggestion: For You by WolfRider (Any song that has whistling in it is ok in my book!)

Language

Words are a glorious thing.  They are truly our only inexhaustible resource and in a world where resources are scarce to come by this is a valuable quality.  They can convey so much without changing at all and it baffles me how much meaning we can put behind even four letter when combined the right way!  I know that I don't have a passion for languages, I'll never have the desire to speak fluent german (even though some of the words are just plain hilarious to say) but I am passionate about the english language.  It's not just speaking it, though I do love to talk, it's the power behind something that without all else wouldn't exist.  Side-note: Do you ever have conversations with people in your head before approaching them, but by the time you actually have the conversation you're so exhausted from the one in your head that it doesn't turn out at all like you planned, happens to me all the time!  But I digress, words are everything, think about it, they can be an escape or a wake-up call, a comfort or a cruelty, a contradiction or a harmony, they're just strikingly vast that I can't wrap my head around it!  I had a teacher in High School who once said that she hates it when people say things like words are failing them or there aren't proper words to describe something because it's not that the words don't exist, it's that we aren't putting forth the effort to find the right ones.  I completely agree and I think sometimes it's easy to fall back on old standards or what's expected rather than taking the time to figure out what exactly it is we want to say.  "Words, when well chosen, have so great a force in them, that a description often gives us more lively ideas than the sight of things themselves." Joseph Addison knew what he was saying and from now on I'm going to be less careless about my choice of words and less cautious about saying them!
Have a RUN-believable day!

 

Grounded

It's been a while since I've posted and if anything I've discovered that not expressing my thoughts often enough leads to some really unhealthy results so writing out what I'm thinking about in such an anonymous and detached way is a lot more beneficial than even I realized! Today's post is really a culmination of a bunch of recent events that individually would already be overwhelming, but together have made for a pretty rough couple of weeks.  Do you ever have those moments where you find yourself grounded to reality whether you like it or not?  Like all you want to do is suspend realism for just a little while and lose yourself in the imaginary because it's soo much better than your present, but you can't because deep down you know that eventually you'll have to deal with the consequences.  If you understand what I'm talking about then congratulations you're human and have the unfortunate luck of dealing with the constant battle between the logical and the emotional that everyone faces.  I've done a fairly decent job so far this summer of balancing the abstract imaginary world of my desires and my future and my idealism with the concrete world of the present and reality.  However, my perfect balance was ripped apart and now I'm grounded in a reality that, as much as I would love to leave it behind, is too important to forsake.  One of those things is my grandfather passing away at 2 am this morning.  While my relationship with him was not a strong one it still pains me to know that someone who shares my last name and part of my past is no longer with us, more importantly, I hurt for people I know who are more affected than I am.  Yet, what hits me the most is the harsh reality that time is not a part of that imaginary abstract ideal, but rather a concrete and tangible entity.  Time has a beginning and an end for all of us which is horribly morbid and that epiphany almost caused me to run straight into a mailbox this morning, but the truth is that the only thing that can truly outlast time is the past not the future.  Our legacy. Our friendships. Our work. Our influence. Those things that we have done live on.  I think it really boils down to the fact that we live in our future, but we die in our past.  This really grounded me to reality and the reality that I shouldn't wait to say things to people who need to hear them or do things I need to do; I have to make them a part of my past as soon as possible before I no longer have the opportunity.  Then I found out that my dog, the only living being that truly appreciates my rapier wit and sparkling personality (insert sarcastic tone here), has to have surgery which makes the part of me that wants to do everything in my power to help in any way I can feel hopelessly lost because, as much as I wish I could, I do not have the skills to perform surgery and make her better.  Then, another thing that happened was that after almost two months of blissful denial on my end I had a breakdown at a campsite in the Middle of Nowhere, Pennsylvania surrounded by motorcyclists and insects intent on making my life an itching hell (On a positive note the actual camping aspect was super rewarding and made me feel incredibly accomplished even if there were showers nearby...).  I'm not sure what exactly triggered it, now that I think about it though it was probably the country music because seriously that would drive anyone to the edge, but I couldn't run away from reality anymore.  I was informed that I'm a difficult person to get to know, which surprised me because I pride myself on being pretty open and to the point with people rather than ambiguous or closed off, but it made me see that relying on people is necessary if you expect them to rely on you.  So while breaking down like that made jumping into the susquehanna river, toxic substances and all, look particularly inviting it was probably necessary.  It just means that I can't go back to the imaginary world I had stored so much of that part of me anymore, I have to stay grounded in reality a little longer and work to find a new balance with new information to incorporate.  And maybe every once in a while not force myself to be okay with things for everyone else's sake and just accept that sometimes in that battle of wills I mentioned above even the emotional side can surprise attack behind enemy lines in an effort to scatter logic's forces and succeed.  When you're at war with yourself reality is hard to avoid and with nowhere to turn taking a breath and regrouping is your only option so that's what this post is about.  Regrouping and remembering that reality is not something to run from just because it brings us extreme sadness sometimes, it's something to cherish because on the other end of that spectrum is extreme happiness.  Serge Daney a french cinema critic wrote once, "In an age of synthetic images and synthetic emotions, the chances of an accidental encounter with reality are remote indeed".  These encounters are painful, but they're purposeful too and they can be beneficial to us all if we choose to see them as reminders that reality has such wealth to offer us if we choose to come down from the clouds.  Sorry if this wasn't as light-hearted or random as my other posts I just couldn't find it in me to be very humorous today, but tomorrow can always be another story and another run.
Have a RUN-believable day!   

Belonging/Community/Every Other Self-Help Title Ever

There's got to be a list out there of all the things people intrinsically want as humans because I keep noticing more and more how universal a lot of emotions we experience on a regular basis are.  Wanting to belong is just one of them that I've been thinking about lately.  I think on some level we all want to belong to something or some group because belonging to a community is a large part of cultivating an identity for ourselves.  I read an article in my Social Aspects of Sexuality class that discussed the tenuous nature of communitites and how they erect these imaginary boundaries to help define the group and the individuals in it.  The vast amount of imaginary communities out there is overwhelming which is good for all of us because the odds are in our favor that we'll find one we fit in with, if this we're the Hunger Games of social acclimation we would totally be winning! (Nerd Alert! I couldn't help it I just couldn't stop thinking of "May the odds be ever in your favor") That aside, sometimes it's difficult to pick the 'right' group and I put right in quotations because I think it's a little obtuse for any one person to claim what is right or wrong for anyone else.  I'm just saying that with so many options people have to try on different communities, different identities, to find what fits best and often we mess up.  I certainly have, the number of times I tried to force something just because I thought it would look nice on my resume is a number even I'm ashamed of, but in the end I started to shed some of this imaginary weight to find what Anna Quindlen calls "your authentic self".  This notion is particularly intriguing to me because I truly believe that we go through a whole bunch of "selves" before we find our authentic one.  The problem with associating too much of our own identity with that of a community means that we become dependent on both the strongholds of that community as well as its boundaries.  People are complex, man oh man are we complex, and limiting ourselves like that is just plain dumb! I'm headed back to Wisconsin this weekend, shout-out to the Midwest raise all the roof's on all the houses, and I started to wonder if who I am today still aligns with the Midwestern values I was raised in?  Should I start feeling more of a sense of belonging with the East coast now?  I discovered that I can't shake my Midwestern background, nor do I want to, and I can't stop myself from finding who my authentic self is in this Eastern climate.  So I won't.  Every community I'm a part of, abstract or concrete, has shaped me and will continue to do so, but as long as I allow myself to think about who I am inside this whole machine they won't control my authentic self.  If you feel like you don't belong, surprise yourself, look a little deeper or search a little harder because I guarantee that someone, somewhere, would love to start an imaginary community with you! You can form the world's smallest cult (Joke! That was a joke I do not support cult activity!) or a two-person traveling circus whatever your interests are.  I won't be running in Wisconsin - gasp - so I won't be updating for a while, but while I'm eating cheese curds in the great state of the Green Bay Packers I'll be hoping everyone has a RUN-believable day!

Happiness

Tomorrow I'll write more I promise, but today it's going to be short, simple, and too the point!  Everything is going to be okay!  Oprah tells us to think of three positive things in our lives every morning to start our day off right and while Oprah has to have reached some sort of God-complex by now the thought isn't a bad one.  Today I had the strangest feeling that my life is really good and it just kept getting stronger.  Strange not because I haven't had a good life before this, but strange becasue lately everything just feels like an uphill battle for me.  Anything from family issues to personal issues has been on my back and being optimistic was a goal I had to set for myself, but today I woke up optimistic and didn't have to try to maintian it at all.  Progress! My life is really good, I have hilarious and incredible friends who go out of their way to visit me at work all the time, grandparents who continue to amaze me, a dog who still loves me even though I smother her to death, and a lot to look forward to.  I read that Type-A personalities are always thinking about what's next while they're doing what they have to do now which makes it extremely difficult to give either the attention it deserves.  Sometimes we have to stop everything and be decisive about what the present should be because who knows if tomorrow will be as good as today; for today getting a visit at work before going to play some sand volleyball, which is a crime against humanity that they let me play volleyball because I am far too clumsy for that sport, and eating peanut butter out of the jar with a spoon is more than enough to make me happy.  If anyone reads this, feel free to comment below with whatever made you happy today, anonymously or not! 
Have a RUN-believable day!

She seriously needs to just go buy her own island and start a cult or something before she takes over the entire world!
Song Suggestion: Breeze Blocks by Alt J

People Who Need People

Points to anyone who recognizes the title (or an imaginary cupcake because who wouldn't prefer that)!  A little while ago I had a discussion with my friend about how crazy it is to think that we see so many people everyday and yet never really take the time to actually notice them.  This all started because my friend saw me driving home from the library and we wondered how many times in the past we had passed each other and never knew it before becoming friends.  This topic is one of many that keep me up at night.  After the conversation I didn't really seriously consider it again until I read a quote from an author I actually think I hate a little bit, I know hate is a strong word but literature inspires strong emotions okay, by the name of John Steinbeck who wrote, "I wonder how many people I've looked at all my life and never seen".  Then last night at a baseball game my friends and I were stuck for about an hour in the parking lot where we ended up having a conversation with a bunch of guys tailgating right next to us.  Complete strangers that I otherwise would never have noticed and I'll probably never see any of them again, but at least if I do I'll know that I'm seeing them.  That's what is actually so hard for me to grasp about all of this is that I wish there was a way we could recognize when someone we pass will be important to us later on in life.  Like some sort of signal or maybe a gut feeling you get when you pass someone that says "Hey, you should stop and introduce yourself because you'll be seeing them again in the future".  I know it's ludicrous to try and actually see everyone you pass in a day I just can't help but feel like we waste so much time with people who are important to us by not being aware of their importance earlier.  There's nothing I can do about it and I ought to just let it go, but today on my run I slowed down every time I passed someone and tried to really notice them just in case.  All of my neighbors now think I'm either crazy or was raised in some progressive new-age household where parents don't teach their children manners or that it's not polite to stare (I assure you my household was anything but new-age) but at least I'll recognize them if we cross paths again.  We can't predict the future, unfortunately, but we can make the effort to see people now while we have the chance. 
Update: That whole positive thinking spiel, TOTALLY WORKS! I tried it at work the past couple of days and made more tips than ever before, thank you positivity for funding my obsession with cherry peel-apart twizzlers and hard-cover books.
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song Suggestion: Are You Free - Jhameel

For those of you who didn't receive the free cupcake above I'll let you off the hook with this one, here's a hint!

The Power of Positive Thinking

"You don't have the luxury of negative thought".  I never considered negativity a luxury before, but after reading Christina Applegate's section of Katie Couric's book The Best Advice I Ever Got: Lessons from Extraordinary Lives where she really does not have the luxury of thinking negatively in her life it kind of makes sense.  Here's a woman who has battled her way through physical trauma, both visible and not, throughout her whole career and she attributes a lot of her recovery to positive thinking.  In fact to quote her directly "this shit works!"  I started reading Katie Couric's book because I'm fascinated by quotes and my book of quotes was looking a bit thin so where else to turn but a book that claims to hold the BEST advice?  Oddly enough and completely unrelated one of the sections has someone stating that you really shouldn't take other people's advice... contradictory much.  Anyways, this book is full of great anecdotes and life lessons if anyone's interested, but mainly this passage got me thinking about the power of positive thinking.  Christina Applegate claims it helped her heal a broken bone faster than doctors thought possible and while I don't have any evidence quite as convincing as that to share I agree that positive thinking can go a long way.  I tried it out on my run today and the results were pleasantly affirmative.  Every time I started to feel like I was slowing down and started thinking negatively about myself and running I made myself smile.  I also made myself think about the outcome I wanted from this run and what I had to look forward to afterwards which seemed to make things more than bearable.  In turn I ended up running longer than expected and forming some very strong thoughts about positivity.  Negativity is a luxury because when it comes down to it if we're able to have negative thoughts that means that we have something good in our lives to lose.  People who actually have cause to be negative don't waste time on those thoughts, they have real problems to deal with whereas those of us with a lot of positives in our lives take these negative thoughts for granted because that's all they are, just thoughts.  I'm lucky to have this luxury and it's about time that I stop taking it so much for granted.  Mission: PositiveThinking is underway... dun dun. dun dun. dun dun. dun dun. dadada. dadada... that's the mission impossible theme song by the way (nerd alert!) Basically, in my everyday dealings I'm going to try and think of the positives above all else and keep a smile on my face while I do it.  Also because I've never known anyone to look good while they're scowling which I'm doubly sure applies to me as well!
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song Suggestion:  Light Falsetto Music - The Hood Internet

Relationships

Setting aside my feminist rant concerning relationships and the social evolution behind masculine and feminine roles I just want to start by saying that I am about as far from being an expert on relationships as one can get.  Therefore, anything I say in this post can be taken with about a kilogram of salt!  However, I do know what it feels like to fall for someone and not have it returned.  I also know what it's like to be that person to not return someone else's feelings and let me tell you that at both ends of the spectrum you are royally screwed.  I believe that it is human nature to avoid pain or being the cause of it.  We have so many tactics to prevent these things from happening on a daily basis and being cynical is one of them.  It's much easier to look at something and stand against it rather than pour ourselves into it and have the chance of getting hurt by it in the end.  I've always been cynical about relationships, but recently I had a conversation with a very close friend of mine who made me look like a freaking hopeless romantic!  That is a very difficult thing to do i.e. I laugh at both the Titanic and the Notebook.  But she, and she knows who she is, has the impression that relationships and in particular dating is a waste of time.  Recently she wrote about this conversation and how she couldn't express it at the time, but she's really less of a cynic than she portrays and more of a, wait for it, human being!  To her expressly, everything you said is not eccentric or unjustified in any way.  Being in a relationship is all about vulnerability; I believe that there is absolutely no possible way to remain completely in control in a relationship.  We relinquish the control we have over our emotions for control over theirs.  This all sounds a little matrix-y but all I mean is that to be in a healthy relationship is to trade the parts of you that you want them to know intimately for the parts of them you love.  Love is an all-consuming kind of emotion that doesn't work if you try to have it in moderation.  Love is not for restraint or for protection it's for losing who we are and finding it again in all of the things we like in that person only to realize that the whole time we thought we had lost it they we're holding on to it for us.  If they won't have the patience to hold onto us while we tread water in the beginning then it won't work.  However, I had a conversation with some people last night about how obsessive love can get and how this exchange can go wrong if instead of holding onto who we are for us that other person absorbs it until both people are changed, but not for the better.  Basically love, like practically everything else in this world, lives only in the extremes.  But honestly who wants a love of indifference?  "Oh yeah we've been together for 2 years because we like each other just fine..." said no one ever!  The trick to this whole spiel is finding that person and here I will not compromise when I say that just as everything happens for a reason, everyone happens for a reason!  I firmly believe that there is someone out there for everyone and even if it takes those two people 80 years to become ready to meet each other once they are it'll be inevitable.  Now that I've lost all credibility as a cynic I'll end with one of my favorite quotes from Maya Angelou who once wrote
"The first time someone shows you who they are, believe them"
Take that how you will on this gloriously work-free summer saturday and have a RUN-believable day!

Song Suggestion: I Already Forgot Everything You Said by The Dig

Nostalgia

When I was a kid, running through a sprinkler was one of the most exciting and daring activities in the summer.  It was so exhilirating to try and time your jump perfectly with the arch of the water not to mention how great it felt when it was so hot outside.  Today I ran past a bunch of neighborhood kids playing in the sprinkler and I had my second bought of nostalgia for the day.  The first came when a little girl got strawberry frozen yogurt with sprinkles at work and it made me think about how simple things are when we're younger, I mean we eat frozen yogurt now instead of just good old-fashioned ice cream... what happened?  But anyways, these kids were having the time of their lives which made me want to run over and either a) join them or b) warn them that it doesn't last forever, both of which would have been incredibly creepy.  Instead I kept running, but the nagging thought of what else I miss from my childhood wouldn't leave me.  So I composed a list and decided to rekindle at least one of these activities. 

• Hula Hoop and/or jump rope (though my coordination seems to have gotten worse with age so...)
• buying ice cream from an ice cream truck
• going to a waterpark
• going to a farmers market (Wisconsin has the BEST farmer's market, shocking I know, and I'll be there soon enough!)
• making a prank phone call (totally juvenile which is kind of the point)
• going camping in your back yard (seeing as I have no back yard this may be difficult so someone with a back yard that is decently normal and would like to help me out, call me maybe!)

Basically I'm too old for some of these things and will never be too old for other's but I don't care because this summer is mostly about finding happiness in day to day things for me which has been surprisingly easy so far and children are typically pretty happy which means we must have been doing something right back then!  Either way everyone should make their own list and do something on it even if you feel utterly ridiculous! 
Have a RUN-believable day!

Song Suggestion: In keeping with today's theme I'm throwin' it back with Ignition by R. Kelly

Denial

Have you ever had someone tell you "De-nile isn't just a river in Egypt" and you just wanted to punch them in the face... yeah that phrase has never sat very well with me.  I guess it's because you know that they know that you know what you're trying really hard to not know and you know that they know that you don't want to know it so they're just being an asshole.  That really convoluted sentence just means that they're not only an asshole, they're also a really good friend.  The things that shock us the most are the things that we know to be true and the things we defend ourselves from so fiercely are the ones that will change us in the greatest ways.  Personally I think those moments of revelation are extremely phony because it's not the revelation that's so shocking to us, it's the disruption of our carefully crafted delusion that provides that electric form of therapy.  We're really very good at convincing ourselves that something is true when in reality nothing could be further from it.  The universal truths about these delusions is that they always always fall apart at some point.  We have to face the music, so to speak, and adapt hopefully to what's real and not just jump straight back into the de-nile!  Denile certainly serves a purpose though, it offers a temporary escape from what our mind says we're just not ready to accept yet.  I think that's alright, everyone deals with things in their own time.  I've spent the past 19 years of my life being blissfully happy with a life I was no where near mature enough to accept was unfulfilled.  When you're six years old the only thing you care about is when the ice cream truck is going to make it's rounds and whether or not that flintstones push-pop will be sold out because if it is so help me I will lead a street-wide protest against that ice cream truck!  You don't think about things like making the most of every moment or how your teenage years are almost gone and you have very little to show for it.  When you're six your life is the best bubble of denial it can be, but we all grow up (Peter Pan is clearly false advertising for children, and incredibly politically incorrect I realized after watching it recently) and the bubble bursts.  The way I see it, with this new fangled thing I'm trying called optimism, when the bubble bursts it just means that there's an opportunity for the sun to make it's way in finally and we can all get a tan!  Now that I know more about myself and who I really want to be in the future I can work for towards it and if I ever try to take it easy on myself I have some incredible assholes, uh I mean friends, to set me straight! Also today on my run I saw at least five people sitting in someone's driveway trying to get this cat out from behind the wheel of a truck so the owner could pull out of their driveway and seeing as it's about 90 bajillion degrees here and that was the only shade I was secretly rooting for the cat!  But seriously, since when did that become a new joke... how many people does it take to move a cat... doesn't quite roll off the tongue.
Have a RUN-believable day!

Song Suggestion: Guns for Hands by Twenty One Pilots or really anything by them because I got to see them live the other day with some of the most inspiring and life-altering people I know who also happen to be a couple of my closest friends and they were out of this world!

Character

No I don't mean from a book, I mean that upstanding, moral center everyone seems to rely on when we describe what can't be put into any other words about the people we spend time with.  I find it very difficult to describe specific aspects of people's personalities or attributes they hold that make me trust them or want to befriend them.  I think it really all boils down to a person's character.  Call me old-fashioned, but I'm a firm believer in this notion that we all have this center driven by a multitude of things.  The whole nature vs. nurture argument could be called into play here, but as far as I can tell it's neither one nor the other.  A combination of our innate nature and the way we are raised/our environment makes the most sense so I really don't get why people are so bent out of shape about it?  In the end, the one thing they all seem to agree on is that something is cultivated in us that represents a character we portray for others to pick up on.  The real question on my mind is whether character is something that can change over time or if we reach a point where we've come upon this realization of what is part of our very being and we won't compromise on these morals?  I'm leaning toward the latter because the more I think about it the more I realize that for as much as I've changed over the past year when it comes down to it there are a lot of fundamental parts of myself, my character, that have been steadfast to my benefit.  I believe that if we can truly embrace our own character it will make us a better judge of character in others.  Not all of my friends are alike in their beliefs or personalities, but I know that I can relate to all of them deep down and that's what made me gravitate to them in the first place.  As long as character is still considered a viable resource I'm not worried about my future or my friendships.  I wonder who came up with "character" in the first place... unlike Sir Isaac Newton who came up with the most worthless topic known to mankind, calculus, I'd actually like to shake this person's hand.  Not like in that Arby's commercial though because that just freaks me out in a major way, it's just a hand stretching out of your take-out bag (Seriously get in line Arby's, Wendy's already has that market cornered with the finger in the chili)!  On that note...
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song Suggestion: Sleepyhead (Chrome Canyon Remix) - Passion Pit
By the way, when I typed character into google this classy chap showed up... what a statue

Labels

I was thinking about what my post for the day would be about and what I would call it as I ran today and that sparked a very controversial and heated discussion between me, myself and I, needless to say I won!  The topic for debate - labels - the question at hand - why are we so obsessed with them?  The debate comes from my desire to denounce labels altogether and one day live in a society where we're all above needing labels to function, that or a society that functions entirely underground, and my admittance that on some level labels are a necessary evil.  Just as James Madison reluctantly forfeiteted all claim against political parties I too must admit that labels are an integrated part of our society that give identity to people, places, things, experiences, even memories, however I don't need an entire newspaper to get my point across, this post will do just fine.  I mean, labels are everywhere! There's even a section on this site that is dedicated to placing labels on your post so people can track them.  They deal with our sexual orientation, religious affiliation, location, education, what food we'll eat, hair color, height, income, etc. before we know it we'll be labeling people based upon what kind of fingerprint they have.  Just because they're everywhere doesn't mean I have to like it though.  By these standards I would be considered an overwhelming number of different labels.  Luckily for you it's not necessary to figure them all out you can just call me Sarah.  I truly dislike labels, but even more so I hate having to feel like I need to justify myself as something another person is labeling me as.  Let me clarify, if you were going about your business just doing you and someone approached you questioning an aspect of your character that you had always assumed was just natural how would you feel?  I personally feel a mixture of shame and affront.  Who are they to question my personal choices, but at the same time a tiny part of me wonders what's so wrong that someone noticed it in the first place?  Ya know what I say, let people label you and let them associate what they want with you because nice people get proven nice in the end and I can't think of a single thing wrong with being labeled as that nice girl from across the street who walks her dog every morning before work and likes to play her music a little too loudly!  I'm off to drive my used ford taurus that I just got today, interestingly enough since taurus is the horoscope until May 20th my Taurus is a Taurus! 
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song Suggestion: Breath of life - Florence and the Machine (It's intense!!)   

Expectations

Expectations make a lot of sense to me.  As humans we have this annoying habit of believing in things we can't see, whether that be some convoluted concept or an intangible future, and we cling to it.  Having expectations is akin to this in that we believe something will happen and plan around it as if it's set in stone while the truth of the matter is that all we really have is hope.  Expectations can turn out either way, they can pull through and work out all according to plan or they can fall through and only offer up a void where those hopes used to be.  I expect every song Lea Michele sings to be unreal and she never dissapoints, however, I also expect there to be granola in the pantry in the morning which is not always the case given I have an older brother who eats anything he can get his hands on...  Expectations to me are a lot like making a souffle, you spend a majority of your time doing the prep work, fastidiously measuring out the ingredients, pain-stakingly folding it all in and then you wait and hope that when you take it out of the oven it doesn't sink like the titanic.  When it does it's heartbreaking, but unlike expectations at least with the souffle you have a decently tasting if not oddly shaped dessert to eat still.  I've reached a crossroads when it comes to expectations because this past year really messed with my beliefs on this very subject.  It's in my nature to have high expectations for myself and others.  Lately, these expectations or rather I should say the unfulfillment of these expectations has been a real bummer.  I'm at a point where I'm beginning to start planning things to look forward to in the upcoming years, but because of my long-running streak of let downs I'm hesitant to do so.  Do I forge on and set expectations for the future or simply decide to have no expectations at all and therefore never be dissapointed?  On the one hand, not having any expectations means that I'll never be setting myself up for rejection, but on the other hand all that means is that I'm simply existing.  I think I would rather be more of an active participant in my own life than that.  Plus, a majority of our lives are spent expecting things while we only spend a brief moment in time fulfilling those expectations or experiencing their demise.  It seems like a fair trade-off to spend most of our lives clinging to Pandora's last contender for a few moments of dissapointment every now and then.  Interestingly enough Pandora's box is really Pandora's jar in original myth because it's supposed to symbolize femininity and fertility which is super ironic considering Pandora was created to destroy all of mankind through womanhood... yeah the ancient greeks were kind of mysoginistic pricks (my Ancient Mythology professor would be so proud right now!) Basically, I'm going to continue to have expectations and hope I don't get burned in the end so if you've experienced something similar recently take note that we have expectations every day without even realizing it so even though you may be upset over something that didn't quite turn out for you I'm sure there's something new you're already looking forward to without even knowing it!
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song suggestion: Spring- Fortune Family

Last Words

Heyo! This will be brief today but I just finished a book I've been reading and naturally my mind chose to focus on that for the duration of my run.  The book is called Looking for Alaska  by John Green who has a very cavalier style of writing that I find amusing.  In the book the main character Miles is obsessed with people's last words and he knows some pretty random ones from Francois Rabelais last words "I go to seek a Great Perhaps" to John F. Kennedy's  which were "that's obvious".  Some are pretty inspirational like John Adam's who used his dying breath to state "Thomas Jefferson still survives" which is either the ramblings of a dying old man or a really epic statement about the continuancy of our democracy.  Some are silly like, for instance, Thomas Jefferson's who used his dying breath to ask "This is the Fourth?"  Last words is a rather morbid topic, but I'm fascinated! What is so important that in leiu of all else someone would choose to make that statement as their last?  Sure people don't always know it's their last moment of verbosity, but if you did what would you say?  If you knew it was the last impression you would make what would win out?  I would like to think my last words would be some really powerful message that would be passed on in a book years later, but truthfully it will probably be about food... If you're as interested as I am John Green references a book called Famous Last Words by Laura Ward where I'm sure some gems are to be found.  Tangent time: I didn't even realize that the food network has no strictly vegetarian shows which is frankly surprising!  I'm trying to go vegetarian which is proving to be a challenge, but a worthwile one so who knows maybe that's my calling in life? 

Have a RUN-believable day!

Comfort

"Anxiety is a glimpse of your own daring" Wise words from Maria Shriver on a feeling most people get when they start to attempt something outside of their comfort zone.  And who came up with this idea of a comfort zone, how is it that we're instinctually okay with some things but not others?  I'm not sure how I know that karaoke would be a terribly anxiety-riddled idea for me to have, but I do which according to Maria Shriver means I should most definitely give it a try, although I'm sure anyone in the audience at the time will be cursing the day I ever read that quote... Regardless I have mixed feelings about comfort.  There is nothing besides a hot shower when you're feeling under the weather that is better than a steaming mug of hot chocolate while you curl up in your flannel pajamas that your grand-parents got you two years ago and no longer cover your ankles with one of those dusty leather-covered classics you're required to read for school.  Being comfortable is practically a life-style for me and those flannel pajamas, yeah I own some and I'm fairly certain the puritans would not approve of the amount of ankle showing when I wear those bad boys!

However, there are certain times where comfort is overrated.  For instance, I went white-water rafting one year with my family and I was terrified!  I'm talking crippling anxiety, honestly though you're willingly entering rapids filled with bone-crushing rocks with the only thing separating you being a raft you're not even strapped into... so I thought it was pretty justified.  Needless to say I sat in the middle of the raft fearing for my life practically the whole time.  By the end, I decided to try one rapid on the edge and I never went back.  We went rafting again the next year and I was right there with everyone else paddling furiously through a class 5 rapid and loving every minute of it.  Don't get me wrong, I still get anxious at the thought of activities that threaten my very existence, but if that experience taught me anything it's that you might live to see another day if you stay in the middle of the raft, but are you really living?  This summer I'm trying to do something new everyday and now when I get anxious about an idea rather than dismiss it prematurely I just think of that raft and Maria Shriver shaking her head at me and I push forward.  I mean come on she was married to the terminator that's pretty freaking intimidating, on a side note I really hope that when the divorce ended she turned to him and said "I WON'T be back" because if not what a waste!  Also, why does rain make everything smell so good?  I'm spiralling here so I'll end with another great quote from William Blake who said "He who would do good to another man must do it in minute particulars" which basically means that if we want to do well unto others we have to strive for the little everyday things rather than the grand gestures.  Now I'm off to drink hot chocolate and read Chelsea Chelsea Bang Bang, Chelsea Handler's biography, because that's considered a classic right... and it's the perfect rainy day to get comfortable! 

Have a RUN-believable day!

Song suggestion: Black and Blue by Ingrid Michaelson (My only friend who knows how to play the ukelele, you know who you are, learn how to play this by July because that would be epic!)

Karma

So there I am minding my own business diligently working, okay fine not so diligently working, when a massive crowd of small children comes in for a birthday party.  I don't know if you remember your birthday parties as a child at Chuck E. Cheese or McDonald's, but your parents seem to think that everyone and their brother is your friend when you're younger so there's more people there than you can even count to at that age.  Anyways, I'm standing there behind the counter listening to the screaming as I watch my hard work tarnished by sticky hands and an enthusiastic game of tag when I think to myself 'what did I do to deserve this?'  I got home and immediately set off on a run because I couldn't stop contemplating this notion of karma.  Karma holds a lot of religious significance, but I'm less interested in that component and more interested in the cyclical fashion of punishment and retribution.  My mom always says that it's karma at work when she watches my Uncle, who was a glutton for mischief as a child, try to wrangle his three extremely energetic sons.  He thinks it's karma that she got me... he's a joker that one.  The way I see karma is rather childish actually, but I always picture it as a sort of video game like Mario Kart.  You go around the track and try to collect as many of those coins as possible, sometimes you get a boost or you get to shoot someone with a lightning bolt, but eventually you'll get so excited watching how far ahead of everyone else you are that you'll fall into the lake.  Also, no matter how fast you go or how many coins you collect you're still going around and around on the same track.  Now I don't play video games all that often seeing as I'm the kind of person who has no hand-eye coordination and seems to think that if I tilt my entire body to the right then my avatar will move over more, but this analogy is more apt than anything else I could come up with while I was running so I'm sticking with it!  I don't know if karma works that way exactly and it's highly improbable that the universe is keeping track of how many karma points I have at the moment, but I must have been pretty low today to have been ambushed like that.  Either way, I like thinking that when I let someone into my lane because they didn't realize that their lane ends in 100 ft that I'm adding to some invisible score of mine.  I also like the fact that you only get bad karma if you do bad things, pretty sensical right, so there's no reason for any of us to add bad karma to our lives.  It's almost as if karma is setting us up to do better every day because bad karma just sounds ominous!  Regardless of how you view karma or even if you don't believe in all that tomfoolery being nice hasn't killed anyone to this date as far as I'm aware, but carbs have which is just strange since they're so good... so even though there really isnt any finish line when it comes to karma try to collect as many coins as you can today!
Have a RUN-believable day!
Song suggestion: Hollywood by RAC